It is no secret in the scene that some image creators don’t have enough Beta Testing and seem to be in a constant rush to release images, one of those who creators is the infamous VirtualMan who recently released a 256gb Pi Image on a private torrent tracker (Echo’d shortly thereafter on a Public Chinese Tracker) , aptly named 256gb Rhodium Playbox, an image based on the recent 2play PlayBox creation…. BUT THERE WAS A PROBLEM (READ AFTER THE VIDEO BEFORE YOU CHOOSE TO DOWNLOAD IT!).

Virtualman claimed the image never had enough alpha testers and it was released to them only – even though it was echo’d on the above sources and his own public forum, as well as message to us on the unofficial Arcade Punks Discord.

Rhodium is a precious metal, a member of the platinum family. Rhodium is used, especially on jewelry, to provide a surface that will resist scratches and tarnish, and give a white, reflective appearance. Rhodium is a very rare and higher value than GOLD, PLATINUM combined. So this is the story behind the scenes and synergy these 2 forces have joined 2Play! and Virtualman brilliant minds and talents we have created this exclusive rare image from the ground up for everyone to enjoy! Thank you all again for amazing journey!

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away….Planet Earth, Year 2019… Two great retro-gaming builders united once more to create the new rare gem 256GB_VIRTUALMAN-PLAYBOX!_v1-4.4.6_RHODIUM-EDITION for Raspberry PI3A, 3B, 3B+! All the well known great romsets, features and gems by VirtualMan that people love to this day and the brand new clean 2Play!’s PlayBox base image created this rare & unique 256GB VIRTUALMAN’s PLAYBOX v1 RetroPie 4.4.6 RHODIUM EDITION! Enjoy & May The Force Be With You!

VirtualMan & 2Play!

We asked VirtualMan why the cancellation but he only answered with “too many problems and dependencies I don’t need” and “I had to pull the plug” , other sources have indicated the following more detailed issues…

“It appeared there were some problems with Bluetooth controllers connecting and the latest reicast. It appears the Riecast settings are incorrect as split ram should be set to 384 not 512MB. If new reicast is a problem then they can apply reicast fix on PlayBox and the old patched binary will be set. There were also issues with the first boot low resolution of 800×600 or something that of course will mess the themes to overlap” ANON SOURCE

We (Arcade Punks) had the image uploaded to our private FTP and it burned fine, booted up (on 2nd boot) just fine and we were able to configure a wired controller with the image, the few ROMs we tried playing from various systems all loaded and and looked fantastic.

It does appear lots of the PlayBox scripts have been altered but all in all – its not a bad system image but download and use at your own pearl, we have it sat on a few seedboxes, and will leave it up till we release a newer version, which word on the grapevine is going to happen soon enough…

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